May 2013

05/24/2013

Two local journalists interview a woman working in the sex trade at Heyna Ground, Dar Es Salaam.

By: Teri Fikowski

"Unakwenda wapi?" Translation, "Where are we going?"

I'd seen poverty in my first few weeks in Africa. I mean, who
wouldn't expect to witness some form of poverty in Tanzania having
accepted a six month position as a media rights trainer in the
country's largest city, Dar Es Salaam. But as I observed my
surroundings quickly deteriorate out the window of our van carrying
myself and three local journalists, I became quite aware this was a
different level of poverty. The answer to my question? "Hyena
Ground," a slum in the midst of the urban city setting and my
definition of hell on earth.

It wasn't necessarily the run down conditions that leads me to
describe it as such. Shanty huts, feces alongside makeshift roads,
and utter chaos are to be expected. It wasn't the thousands of flies
feasting on piles of raw chicken meat that from the smell had been
smothering under the sun seemingly all day. It wasn't even the old
Tanzanian man who asked me through drunken slurs to "give him my
vagina" that makes me draw such a conclusion. Rather, it was all
these stereotypical ideas of poverty combined with the reason we were
there; to produce a two part TV and radio series on sex workers in Dar
Es Salaam.

Don't get me wrong, as a journalist it's in my blood to seek out these
type of stories. That doesn't mean I enjoy the reality that girls as
young as 12-years-old are selling their bodies as a means for survival
for less than 1USD.

Actually in this case I hadn't intentionally sought out the story.
Just the day before, I'd approached a young reporter to see what he'd
been working on. He told me he'd been at a police press conference
where it was announced officers would be cracking down on prostitution
in Dar Es Salaam and charging women working in the sex trade. I asked
who else he spoke to to produce the story and wasn't surprised after a
few days amongst the local media to learn only the one source. I
tried to explain the importance of using multiple sources in a report
and to show all sides of the story. Surely it wasn't a lifestyle
these women wanted to be a part of? He was apprehensive at first;
prostitution is illegal in Tanzania. I asked him if he thought
charging these woman would really create a change in society and was
glad when his response was asking for my help following up on the
press conference the next day.

Entering Hyena Ground, we were joined by the street's Chairman and two
of his employees. That made our total number seven and from what I
was told, necessary. After making our way through shacks where men
gambled and walked over others passed out drunk with evidence of local
spirit in children's sand buckets, we approached some of the "working
girls." One of the journalists translated the interview and I heard
what I'd expected but what seemed to come as a surprise to my
colleagues. These women didn't want to be doing what they were doing.
A life subject to disease and violence wasn't an intentional choice
but they said they had no alternative. Some were paying for school
and refused to have their face on camera. Others were desperate and
needed to feed their children, one which was clinging to his mother's
leg. We were also told police collect a group of women from the area
around once a week and if they can't pay a charge do "bad things to
them." At one point a woman broke down and walked away from the
camera. I placed my hand on her back in a pathetic attempt to comfort
her, unable to offer any verbal support even with broken Kiswahili.
Besides, what could I say?

After some time collecting interviews we grew uneasy from an
increasing large crowd forming around our crew so opted to return to
the van. We would later learn from the Tanzanian Legal and Human
Rights Centre there are few statistics regarding the number of women
involved in the sex trade due to narrowed definitions surrounding
prostitution and human trafficking. Despite a three-year action plan
to end in 2014 providing education to law enforcers regarding the sex
industry, many fail to see the possible indicators of victims.
Needless to say, it's easy to grow pessimistic.

It wouldn't be until a few days later I'd celebrate the report's small
victories when other local media outlets picked up the story and when
my colleagues expressed their interest following up on the accusations
against the police. Perhaps the most significant win is their
willingness to show all sides of the story in the future, even if it's
something hard to understand.

When we drove away from Hyena Ground one of the journalists asked me
what I thought. My reaction was uneasy laughter which was returned
with my first true introduction to Tanzania, "welcome to our country."
______

Caption photo #1: Two local journalists interview a woman working in
the sex trade at Heyna Ground, Dar Es Salaam.

Caption photo #2: Many "working girls" at Hyena Ground say they are
living in extreme poverty and cannot feed their families.

Caption photo #3: Working conditions for women in the sex trade in
Dar Es Salaam.

Adelaide
pulls out one of her large lactating breasts and plunks it into the mouth of
her 10 month old baby while she shares her story of how she came to live on the
fringe of the Abokobi garbage dump in Accra.

Plastic
bottles, cans and plastic bags from the dump creep up to her porch.

The
pungent smell of burning rubber and plastic is so strong that my stomach drops
every few minutes and I tell myself to stick it out. I can leave this place,
Adelaide can’t.

The
dump is located on the outskirts of Ghana’s capital city. Outskirts does not
mean uninhabited, and Abokobi is clearly a residential area.

When
Pearl Akanya Ofori, the reporter I work with at CitiFM,
said she wanted to do a report on the Abokobi dumpsite, I figured we might find
people who live and work on the site. They might live in a shack or on the side
of the road I thought. The last thing I thought I’d see was properly erected
homes. I didn’t expect to see an entire village close to the dump, completely
engulfed in toxic smoke.

But
in my amazement the community is growing and someone is even building a large
house Kitty-corner to the dumpsite. Construction workers labour in the smog.

Adelaide
said she moved to her new home with a view of never ending garbage trucks in
March. She said that her last landlord evicted her mother, brothers and sisters
from their home in Adenta, a nearby neighbourhood. She said a friend told her
she could live near the dump. She said she pays rent, but couldn’t tell us how much.

The
smoke is suffocating and she said she often has to leave her house just to
clear her eyes. Her youngest coughs on and off for hours sometimes she said.
There’s a hospital up the street, but she doesn’t think she should go.

Adelaide
does not live at the dump alone. There are many incomplete houses in the
neighbourhood, their brick and mortar foundation still showing. This seems to
be a trend in Accra.

A
path weaves between the houses and we follow it into a clearing where a group
of young men hang out next to a rusty bench press.

These
are the bolla pickers. Bolla means garbage in Twi, which is a local language.

We
ask if they will speak to us. They lead us to their unofficial spokesman,
Abrantie. That’s not really his name, but means young man in Twi. He was
worried about his livelihood and didn’t want to reveal his real name.

Abrantie
travelled from the northern region of Ghana in hopes of more opportunity. He
didn’t have the skills to survive in a city and found himself picking from the
top of the burning bolla.

He
said the work is hot and dangerous, and the bolla is unstable.

The
bolla pickers sell their bits of plastic and water bottles to middle men who
then sell it to a recycling plant or abroad. The most money he has earned for
his efforts is 50 Ghana Cedis ($25 CDN), and that was for two weeks worth of
work.

Right
now he is managing a drink stand the men have set up. He said he needed a
break, but he knows it’s only a matter of time before he has to go back up onto
the bolla.

Looking
at the mountain of refuse, figures of men can be made out through the smoke.
They walk on top of the garbage, bending down to pick up recyclable trash,
dodging the shovels that sift the pile.

I
ask Abrantie and the other men how they feel health-wise. He doesn’t mention
his bad lungs or burning eyes until I asked him about those health concerns
directly. Instead, he spoke about stress. He said they can’t feel too good,
because they don’t know where their next “daily bread” will come from.

I
think on these men and what their lives must be like. I can’t help but wonder
where they get comfort and love. Their lives are so challenging with so little
certainty. They have very little to offer a woman and they have no family in
the area.

The
men crowded around Abrantie as he spoke about the stress. I asked them who
takes care of them. They said they take care of each other. They are brothers.
The brothers of the bolla.

05/14/2013

HIV patients line the hallway of the Fevers Unit Korle Bu
Teaching Hospital in Accra. They wait for hours for their name to be called, so
they can collect their antiviral drugs. Normally the patients would get two to
three months of medication at a time, but since the pharmacists are on a
national strike in Ghana, they are lucky to get 10 days worth.

Juanita Sallah, the local journalist I’m working with at CitiFM,
negotiates her way past the watchful nurses and finds Nana Esi, an HIV patient,
sprawled out on a bench.

Nana Esi is concerned.

To put more pressure on the government, the Government and
Hospital Pharmacists Association announced last week that they were going to
stop administering drugs to emergency patients, the mentally ill and those with
HIV/AIDS. Which means that Nana Esi does not know how much longer she will be
able to get the drugs, and that she is relying on the nurses to accurately
portion out her medication.

“We are worried, we are worried,” she says. “They just give us
bit by bit, bit by bit. We are just pleading with the government to do
something about it.”

We speak with another man battling HIV who refers to himself as
Kwame. He tells us that the strike has become a major inconvenience in his
life, because he has to travel four hours to the hospital every 10 days. This,
he says, makes it difficult for him to work and keep a living.

The problem is that the government, under the Fair Wage and
Salaries Commission, suddenly switched the pharmacists into a new salary
structure, mid-negotiation, without any notice. It’s a part of a new public
servant salary structure, called the Single Spine Salary Structure, which
ensures that all public servants with the same education and occupation will be
paid the same across the board.

The pharmacists were categorized in a much lower salary group
than they think they should be- something closer to nurses, when they say they
should be paid closer to the doctors. Instead of trying to negotiate with the
commission, the Government and Hospital Pharmacist Association decided to
strike immediately, exacerbating an already dire situation, because the doctors
have been on strike since the end of March, leaving the care of the patients to
the nurses.

Talks between the Fair Wage and Salary Commission and the
pharmacists have been non-existent. When Juanita phoned the health minister,
Sherry Ayitey, to find out what her ministry is doing to ensure HIV patients
get their medication, she declined to comment. I called her after the story
aired to see if she would like to have a word before I publish this blog. She
said she did not know about the strike and hung up the phone.

After that exchange, I think of Nana Esi, dabbing her forehead
with a sweat rag in that long hallway. She’s so sick and she is just trying to
survive, but the politics of a nation are getting in the way. As far as anyone
knows, there is no plan to help her or remedy the situation, and now the nurses
are threatening to strike. She should be worried.

Africa Without Maps

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